Anorexia As A Relationship Rejection

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

At the moment, a modern woman is required to create a figure that will undoubtedly be attractive, it should be desirable for men. All this should be in line with accepted, "fashionable" standards dictated by society, the main goal of which is to make a woman more feminine. If a woman does not cope with this task, it is interpreted as weakness, such a woman seems to be deprived of the opportunity for love and respect. The dietary industry is based on these premises. Her slogan is that we can change our body. Weight loss is often touted as the main meaning of how to be feminine, and uniqueness, intelligence, other abilities fade into the background. A woman who adheres to these myths falls under strict control, alas, losing her female identity. In parallel with physiological changes, fasting takes up most of the thoughts and consumes a lot of energy. Fasting makes a woman quiet, obedient, exhausted. Wolfe viewed eating disorders as rooted in an obsessive need for control that very carefully masks the real source of this control - society itself. Phillips viewed phenomena like anorexia as a desire for compensation. Voluntary fasting, as an attempt to make up for a loss or to extinguish frustration, which had such a profound effect on a person that it was reflected in the fear of dependence on others and resistance to making connections due to the fear of loss again. This fear is expressed in the refusal to eat, or rather the refusal of appetite, as a refusal of desire. Desire reminds us of our need for communication, our addiction, and our addiction reminds us of relationships. As a result of giving up our appetite, we become free from desire, we suppress any awareness that we need support and that our need for support has experienced traumatic frustration or abuse. But denying any dependence on others by denying the need for food leads to even more dependence as a result of a deterioration in physical condition. People suffering from anorexia, refuse not only food, but also from intimacy, from contact. They do not allow food or people to enter, rejecting any opportunity to influence themselves. For them, everything is not safe, all food and any interaction. The only defense they are capable of is their closeness. Relationships with food are always related to relationships with people.

Voluntary refusal to eat can be seen as a coping strategy, as a symptom necessary to neutralize the thought of life with the recognition of vulnerability and traumatic loss and the impracticability of the task of restoring trust and dependence. A person directs pain and anger to his body, thereby avoiding interactions with society. Hence the desire for the body to eventually disappear altogether. Many people say that they will never get thin enough, no matter how much they lose weight, and thus remain dissatisfied until they disappear. However, along with the desire to disappear, there is often a polar desire - the desire for love and attention. As the condition worsens, a real drama is played out around the person and he becomes the center of attention. Thus, a person realizes his desire to be noticed, or rather, so that the real I was noticed. For such people, the suppression of anger is characteristic, its direction deep into oneself. Instead of fighting with others and punishing them, a person fights with himself and punishes himself. A person believes that if he acquires an impeccable appearance, then in the end he himself will be able to be impeccable and so will be able to receive the love of others.

Based on the above, it is important to understand that safety is very important for people with anorexia. Before approaching them, it is necessary to create conditions for this approximation. This will most likely require a lot of time and care, sensitivity to their boundaries. Without this, they will not admit. They have a lot of anxiety, they do not trust, they are isolated and afraid, but at the same time they so need love and acceptance, but only when it is safe enough.